Rahul Gandhi slapped with Rs 500 cr legal notice

New Delhi: Congress vice president Rahul Gandhi was on Wednesday slapped with a legal notice by Asom Gana Parishad`s youth wing, giving him 15 days to offer an apology for his purported remarks that the party came to power for a second term in Assam with the support of insurgents.

The AGP youth wing president Kishore Upadhaya said, "If the Congress vice president fails to apologise, we will seek a compensation of Rs 500 crore for damaging the reputation of the party whose members were involved in the six year Assam agitation against foreigners," he said.

"We have given Gandhi 15 days to respond to our notice failing which we will initiate a criminal defamation case against him," he said.

AGP president Prafulla Kumar Mahanta had also earlier stated that the party strongly condemned Gandhi`s comments and was consulting experts for taking legal action against him.

Assam Chief Minister Tarun Gogoi had also endorsed his statement saying that AGP had links with insurgent groups and Rahul Gandhi`s statement was correct that the party came to power in the state allegedly with ULFA`s help.

According to a WikiLeaks report published in the media last month, Gandhi had reportedly told a US diplomat in 2006 that India during his father late Rajiv Gandhi`s prime ministership (1984-1989) had given a separatist group a chance to form the government in Assam and the US should follow the same model with Hamas.